Star-struck investors head to the movies

The finance funds backing films and the music business are raking it in

Alternative investments are enduring mixed fortunes, but entertainment is riding the crunch, with Hollywood studios enjoying record takings and film and music-rights funds performing well.

Broker Cantor Fitzgerald is poised to launch the world's first movie-futures market in the spring, allowing fans to speculate, and film funds, studios and producers to protect themselves against movies not performing as well as expected - and to take advantage of any rise if they do better.

Will these investments deliver, though, or will they be the next to go pop?

FILM AND TELEVISION

Cinemas in the US enjoyed their first billion-dollar January ever, with takings soaring 19% to $1.03 billion (£725m). In Britain last year, box-office takings were up 5% to £949m, as moviegoers tried to take their minds off the economic gloom.

"Entertainment is pretty much recession-proof," said Sean Flanagan, co-founder of Aramid Entertainment fund. "People are looking for cheap escapism."